Frank Branston - Blogging for a Better Bedford

So we got there in the end, but it was a rollercoaster ride.

The tension was stretched out by the Government’s news blackout and the fact that the Brown reshuffle took away the minister we had grown used to dealing with him and brought in another.

With the county council proclaiming vistory over the past couple of weeks we began to wonder if they knew somewthing we didn’t. Fortunately the answer turned out to be no so the people of Bedford are spared the ministrations of County Hall. Given the amount of money they had spent on their bid maybe some questions ought to be asked, but that is for other people.

We are now expecting an all-out election for all the seats in the new authority in May next year. There will be 37 to be contested, all based on existing wards but two members for each urban ward instead of the more normal three although some wards do have only two. Each rural ward will have one member. That will be exactly half the existing number of borough and county councillors within the present boundaries.

The existing borough and county councils will continue to for a year with a transitional body, possibly government-appointed, to ease the handover.

Before the decision was announced the chief officers and politicians of the councils agreed that whoever won there would be a need to work together. At the moment the chagrin of the county council seems to have overwhelmed their commonsense because they are going around saying ‘It isn’t over yet’ but I suppose when they have been confidently expecting a result favourable to them they have got to say something when they are proved wrong.

YOU may have heard that the borough is aiming for ‘Excellent’ status and that the county has been judged ‘Good’ and be wondering what it is all about.

Especially as the two authorities are at loggerheads about what it means.

Here is Branston’s brief digest. I hope it simplifies things for you.

It all comes out of a process called ‘Comprehensive Performance Assessment’ (CPA) which is the Government’s attempt to assess all councils on a level playing field. At the end of a CPA process a council would be assessed as ‘poor’, ‘weak’, ‘fair’, ‘good’ or ‘excellent’.

That was clear enough so naturally it was changed. Now councils may go from no star up to four stars. It doesn’t matter much because the number of stars corresponds with the previous system and are used interchangeably, four star being ‘Excellent’, no stars being ‘poor’.

At the first round of CPAs, the borough got ‘Good’ or three star, the county got ‘Poor’ or no star.

Recently the county got three stars (‘Good’), and now the borough hopes to get the maximum of four stars or ‘Excellent’.

The county is trumpeting its success in getting from no stars to three stars in as many years, but things are not what they seem because 62 per cent of the 34 shire counties are judged ‘Excellent’, which means that any ‘Good’ council is in the bottom third of shire councils. The county’s rating is all the odder as a majority of those polled (57 per cent) are dissatisfied with the county’s services.

Standards are stricter for district councils – which is what the borough is – and only ten per cent of the more than 200 districts are considered ‘Excellent’.

I wouldn’t be so churlish as to point this out if the county hadn’t gone in for all sorts of hoopla when its three stars were announced. In the battle for Unitary status between us and the county these things become much more important as D for Decision day looms. It is now set for July 26.